Bela Lugosi, Dracula, 1930. Chaney was dead before the script was ready. Conrad Veidt was first choice to succeed him. Paul Muni refused to be third. Also in the vampire mix: Carradine, William Courtenay, Ian Keith. Enter: Broadway’s Dracula (during a legendary 1927-1930 run). He refused to be Frankenstein's monster the following year. Enter: Boris Karloff. Bye bye Lugosi. That’s the way it goes in Film City…

Boris Karloff, Frankenstein, 1930. “It’s alive! It’s alive!” Most records state that two actors only - Karloff and Bela Lugosi – were contacted about playing The Monster, as directors were switched from Robert Florey to James Whale. However, Carradine always maintained that he, too, had been considered for the iconic rôle but felt it beneath him and his drama training.

Paul Sotoff, Anthony Adverse, 1935. Sotoff made his third and final film when production delays meant Carradine had to quit being Fernando and report to his next gig.

Frank McGlynn, Sr, The Prisoner of Shark Island, 1935. Carradine lost out to McGlyn who made playing Abraham Lincoln almost his life’s work. He played the 16th POTUS a dozen films during 1915-1939 - or from age 48 to 72! The Prisoner was Dr Samuel Mudd, jailed in 1865 as a conspirator in Lincoln’s assassination, simply because he innocently treating the broken leg of killer John Wilkes Booth.

Jean Hersholt, Seventh Heaven, 1936. All change of Father Chevillon when Don Ameche - like the original lead Tyrone Power - was transferred to Love Is News by Head Fox Darryl Zanuck. Carradine had been the first replacement before Hersholt.

Basil Rathbone, The Adventures of Marco Polo, 1937. John Ford had dropped Rathbone from The Hurricane in Samoa and then invited him to Malibu Lake as Ahmed - starting one week after completing The Hurricane in September 1937. Carradine was lucky to miss the then biggest flop suffered by producer Samuel Goldwyn and his rather homespun Polo. Gary Cooper!

Douglass Dumbrille, Du Barry Was a Lady, 1942.Change for the dual role of Willie and the dream period villain Duc de Rigor - from Carradine to the guy making life hell for everyone from James Cagney and Myrna Loy to (of course!) Gary Cooper and Franchot Tone in The Lives of a Bengal Lancer, 1934, when Dumbrille was first (?) to utter the immortal threat: “We have ways of making men talk!”

Arnold Moss, Kim, 1950. An on/off MGM project since 1935. Seven years later, Carradine was seen for Lurgan Sahib, opposite Mickey Rooney as Kimball O’Hara. Once again, the expense - and politics - of even token shooting in India shelved the project. For a further eight years.

Robert Mitchum, Night Of The Hunter, 1954. After talks with the inevitable, the scared and the interested (Carradine, Gary Cooper, Laurence Olivier), first-time director Charles Laughton had a brainwave… He called Mitchum and warned him: “The role is of an irredeemable shit!” “Present!” said Mitchum.

Charles Watts, Giant, 1955.

Tom Conway, The She-Creature, 1955. During the production delay following the death of headliner Edward Arnold, Peter Lorre simply fled the z-schlock - and, goes the legend, fired his agent for involving him with such crap. Carradine passed on what can only be termed a serial hypnotist. Easily. And, naturally if you can’t keep the tubby, little Lorre n the farm, you go for such an obvious subsititute… as the suave, tall Conway!

Dean Jagger, End of the World, 1977. Newly installed in Hollywood atsuggestion of Billy Wilder and Richard Widmarkk, Lee aimed to avoid horror vehiclesand was “conned’ in to this Z sf number, on the promise of co-starring with vets like Carradine, Basehart, José Ferrer, Arthur Kennedy. “That’s all right by me. But it turned out it was a complete lie.”

Christophe Lee, The Last Unicorn, 1981. Carradine, James Earl Jones and John Vernon were in the toon mix for King Haggard. The book’s author, Peter S Beagle, also supplied the scenario. Lee dubbed himself in the German release print.

Barnard Hughes, The Lost Boys, 1986. Carradine (a horror king) and Keenan Wynn (not so much) were top choice for Grandpa. However, Carradine was in bad health and Wynn died just before shooting started.

Carel Struycken, I Woke Up Early The Day I Died, 1997. Pet project of Ed Wood, worst film-maker in the world. He wrote it in 1960 andcast it in 1974 for Aldo Ray and Carradine... just never actually made it. Actor Billy Zane finally produced it in 1997.(Carradine played 327 screen roles, almost as much as his three sons’ combined output).